The Compass and the Anchor: CH1. Life Goes On 20: Culinary Week and Mom's Birthday

Hello, Tim!

This week has not been any easier than the last two or the days back in high school. But at the same time it is something enjoyable, somewhat buoy, and ample in new things to see and experience.
There are still many things I have planned for myself today, so it would be ideal to do this faster.

Me thinking back to the past week.

Steering Away from the Comfort Zone of Food Making

Back in Taiwan, when I get hungry, I would simply get some rice or noodles prepared with different vegetables and meats and dig in. Only sometimes when I bumped my head against the kitchen cabinet will I have these bizarre ideas like using soy milk to make pasta or adding Japanese curry sauce to Taiwanese thin noodles or cooking risotto with green tea leaves and soy sauce. They are those randoms thoughts that jumped from a to z too fast and before I had the chance to put doubts on these new dishes and their questionable flavors, they are done. But just like I said, they are just some once-in-a-blue-moon anomaly that occurs, but being here in Germany, before the whirlwind of events start happening, exempt of the supervision of the adults and the support from the other housemates, I seem to have spiraled out of control.

It all started with the cabbage pancake and chicken breast as a side dish. I don't have much experience with cooking with flour, given that it is something that my mother does more often. When we have some cabbages left and don't know what to do with it, she would take out our scarce stock of flour and add an egg or two, making light and healthy snacks out of it. I have grown to love the simplicity of it, so I tried to recreate this subtle dish as my dinner. The taste of flour was too strong, but that was one of my very first attempts, so I let it pass.

Mid-cook, I altered the portion of the batter and the flavoring; the last piece was a lot better than the first.

On the same day, after walking back from some evening grocery shopping for a new package of flour, I felt this sudden rush and the impulse to try to make some pancakes with the new package of flour, regardless of the fact that it was already eleven in the evening, almost midnight. I grabbed the plate and the new bag of flour through the corridor and into the kitchen, (still) surprised to find that Ram, Harish, and Johannes were still there. Ram was making curry with cashew nuts (just like he is doing at the moment. I am writing this entry in the kitchen. In front of me, Johannes is having a small pizza whose dough was also hand-made.) and I stated, a little sheepishly, that I was thinking about making some pancakes. They nodded, and Johannes asked me if I needed any eggs for that. This is the "support from the house mates" I was talking about.

I mixed the milk, the egg, and the flour, but instead of getting a baste that I use to see for those fluffy pancakes, I got the baste with a more smooth and liquid consistency which later turned out more like a crêpe. It was nice nonetheless, and I used two sheets of those with yogurt and honey for the breakfast on the following day. To rationalize this, I would offer that I just wanted to get accustomed with utilizing flour in my cooking since it's an unchartered land in my cooking.

The breakfast was really nice, though. I should do it more often.

Featuring: Johannes making pizzas right from the dough to the paste.

I need. His. Skills.

Then the other Taiwanese guy on our floor told me that his friend would be visiting him in Germany and would be staying for around a month and a half. I asked them if they wanted to have a meal together, like a welcome dinner. For that occasion, I thought that something unnecessarily new had to be made. The evening before the dinner I sat at the dining table, silently and metaling checking all my stocks in the cabinet and the fridge. My train of thoughts pulled to a halt at the whole head of iceberg salad. My brain in charge of categorizing all the dishes I had ever eaten channeled to a Taiwanese dish called 蝦鬆. It is something resembling a cabbage roll with diced vegetables and shrimp meat for filling. Here is a picture I found online.

I knew that some concrete idea was forming, so I kept watering it. Based on the iceberg salad, the list of all my groceries went on. In my head, I grabbed the red bell pepper, onion, champignons, and some diced pork (marinated with pepper and soy sauce) and made them into the filling for the cabbage. I then texted Jackey (the Taiwanese) and asked if he would be as kind as to bring me two carrots from the nearby market.

In the morning I had a quick breakfast and then got the slab of pork fillet from the fridge. I would have marinate it after lunch because it didn't really take that much time but since I was only granted a one-hour lunch break, I had to do everything beforehand, i.e. after breakfast. After coming back from the courses (which I will be talking about in a minute) I spent some more time dicing up all the ingredients and get the rice into the rice cooker, trying desperately to catch the dinner by eight. The dicing process took me a bit too long, and when I finally finished all the preparation process it was around the time when the kitchen can be a bit too crowded (During the same time, I baked a cake as well, but we'll get to that later.). I kept an eye on the clock, all the same time thinking of ways to make two dishes at the same time. Jackey arrived in the kitchen with his friend, Bella, at around eight. Punctual.

I quickly cooked both the dishes, one of which a brand new dish I never know would prevail or not.

Saved up some of the surplus sauce and the diced onions for future use.

I was simply too tired to take better pictures, but I have to say that I was really proud of the ice berg salad bowl.

After a total three hours of preparation, my dinner for three was finally presentable on the dining table, and the others liked it pretty much. Bella got a second bowl of rice and Johannes had two cabbage rolls, which was better than any other form of compliments.

The guy on the left is Jackey, and the girl on his right would be Bella.

Then on the next day, I got into my head to make a cream and bell pepper risotto with an apple. It is said that fruits go well with many dishes, and even though I had to agree with my risotto, there was something off that I couldn't name with it. (Just to put it as a record, I met the mysterious French guy named Yves when cooking the risotto, who rarely comes out from his room. He's a gentle and polite guy, and we conversed a bit in French.)

I still want to know what went missing in this dish.

On Sunday, however, the lunch didn't really go as planned. Cooking for the first time with an oven, the marinated chicken breast tasted fine, but the Brussel sprouts and the potatoes were too dry. I should have thoroughly soak it with oil before putting them into the oven, but instead, I casually poured some oil on it and into the oven it went. I am starting to think that I am setting my standards too high in such a short amount of time. I would have to admit that I got a bit carried away with the cabbage rolls.

This was not all that I had. There were way more baby cabbages and potatoes on the original oven plate, and since I swore that I would finish all of them no matter the outcome, I had an overwhelming lunch.

All being said, I still liked the fact that there are so many possibilities I can make with all the resource I have. I accidentally woke Amy up at around 5 a.m., Taiwan time, one day. She jokingly said that I would be going back to Taiwan, not with a bachelor's degree on international business, but for culinary skills.

Let's see what I can still do with the pumpkin I just bought.

Dinner for today was not ideal either; I need to keep a cool head...
(featuring the seafood cream pasta from my friend Zaineb. THAT was really nice.)

The Cake that I just Brushed Through in the Previous Paragraph

好了，該來講講這塊蛋糕的故事了。

前幾天是我媽媽的生日，我一直在思考，在德國的我能夠為我媽媽做什麼。在出國前，我和她已經慶祝過他的農曆生日了-我們去了一家每次生日都依定會去吃的日式料理店，兩個人吃得很開心。但是在他國曆生日的這天我還是想做一些比較特別的事情。

媽媽生日當天，我剛好和Svitlana到市中心、海德堡宮殿散步。用很基本的德文，我問她能不能協助我考一個他上次為整層樓舍友烤的巧克力水蜜桃蛋糕。她想也沒想就答應了，看來她真的很喜歡烤蛋糕。

為了到時候回家能夠再次重現這塊蛋糕的味道和背後的心意，我想將整個步驟寫下來。

這個蛋糕不會用到但跟牛奶，一開始Svitlana就是顧慮到六樓的朋友們有些是純素食主義者、又有人對乳製品過敏才決定用這份食譜。

首先，揺兩碗的砂糖到大碗中，依序加入三大湯匙的可可粉、一小包小蘇打粉、一湯匙香草糖、還有五湯匙的沙拉油。稍作攪拌後加入兩碗的麵粉還有一碗水。似乎可以視情況多加麵粉或是水。攪拌完之後加入喜歡的水果（水蜜桃、櫻桃、蘋果都可以）就可以把蛋糕糊倒入蛋糕模型了。

烤蛋糕的初學者

烤箱轉到180度烤個45～60分鐘就可以了。說實話，整體步驟不會特別難，非常適合我這種烘焙初學者。Svitlana 因為是交換學生，十二月底就要會去烏克蘭了。希望能夠跟她多累積一些烘焙的經驗，以後自己烤蛋糕給家人、朋友吃。

Johannes 借我的蛋糕模型（據說有超過三十年的歷史了）

傳回去給台灣的大家看到最後都變成答應他們回去要做給他們吃。

烤過的桃子（準確來說是Nectarine，好像是油桃）

當然，我沒有忘記烤這塊蛋糕的目的。我請Johannes幫我們大家跟蛋糕拍張合照，傳給媽媽。雖然實際上晚了一天（算上時差晚了兩天）但是我只希望做蛋糕的這份心意有傳達到。

媽媽，生日快樂。

而且，蛋糕很好吃。

我第二天早上把剩下的兩片當早餐吃掉了。

A Week of Courses

Ach so, diese Woche habe ich so viele Vorlesungen gemacht. Nach den Unterrichten habe ich einige Probleme. Die zwei Lehrer sind interessant und sie erklären ihnen gut über das Thema, und alles war auf Englisch. Ich konnte alles verstehen, aber ich finde es schwer, um alles, was die Lehrer gesagt haben, im Kopf zu halten. Zurück in Taiwan wurde alles auf Mandarin unterrichtet, deshalb sind die Fachwörter, die auf Englisch sind, ganz neu für mich.
Ich glaube, dass es nur Zeit braucht, um mich an der englischen Vorlesungen gewöhnen.

Am Montagabends habe ich auch französische Kurse. Die Lehrerin spricht nicht so laut und ich habe nicht so gut verstanden. Dort habe ich mit einem Mann kennengelernt. Er kann schon Französisch gut sprechen, weil er seit einem Jahr in Paris war. Ich habe mich mit ihm ein bisschen auf Französisch unterhaltet und ich frohe mich darauf, dass ich in Deutschland Französisch üben zu können.
Im Deutschkurs am Freitagnachmittags bin ich mit Svitlana. Die andere Teilnehmer sprechen besser Deutsch als ich, aber ich glaube, dass es eigentlich gut für mich ist, weil ich denn die Motivation habe, um Deutsch schneller zu lernen.
Es war nur die erste Woche meiner Kurse bei SRH. Alles wird verbessern.

Ich: Ich nehme Fotos nicht so gern; Ich bin immer so peinlich mit dem Fotoapparat.
Auch ich: Das ist mein Zuhause.

Updates on My Reading Routine

Ich möchte noch etwas auf Deutsch schreiben, deshalb spreche ich etwas über das Buch, das ich seit mehr als einem Monat lese. Ich kann aber nicht so viel darüber erzählen, weil ich meine Denken sparen muss, um in der Zukunft, wenn ich das Buch fertig lese, zu schreiben.

Foto in Taiwan genommen.

Das Buch heißt Beautiful Boy und ist über die Droge und der Kampf, den der Vater eines abhängigen Sohn durch gefahren ist. Droge ist ein sehr schlimmstes und weltweites Thema, und man soll darüber lernen. Dies Buch, das wurde von dem Vater geschrieben wurde, hat so viele Emotionen und sind mir ganz traurig. Das Gefühl, dass du verantwortlich für deine Beliebte bist, ist unbeschreiblich schlecht.

I habe so viele Dinge zu Deutschland mitgebracht, aber ich bin frohe, dass ich dieses Buch mitgenommen habe.

Diese Foto wurde im Schloss Heidelberg genommen. Das werde ich unbedingt machen.

End

Oui, je finis en écriant en français. Comme toujours, il y a tant d'autre choses à dire/ à écrire, mais si j'utilisais tout le temps devant de mon ordinateur, je n'aurais pas de temps pour être à mes pieds sur la rue; pour voir tous les mystères si différents.

Petit tour dans la Schloss Heidelberg avec Svitlana :D

Le coucher du soleil.

Un petit paradis pour les enfants.

Dans centre-ville j'ai vu un père qui jouait du xylophone avec sa fille. Avec Svitlana j'ai pratiqué de parler en français et ça me plaisait bien. Il me faudrait aussi du temps pour être tout seul temps en temps, parce que je veux me réfléchir et me reposer un peu. Ça prend si longtemps, et j'ai presque tout fait.